Our State is happy to present the Our State Book Club with Wiley Cash! Each month, New York Times bestselling author Wiley Cash handpicks contemporary books by fellow North Carolinian authors and those writing books set in the state, encouraging readers to join in the fun. Wiley will review each book in both the print and digital versions of the magazine and produce two podcast episodes highlighting the selected book and author.
January’s Book Selection
Writers come to the page for a host of reasons. Some explore images that have long haunted them. Others attempt to understand a confusing world. Author Allan Gurganus writes to understand his hometown of Rocky Mount; in the process, he’s rekindled a love for a place that he once dreamed of leaving behind.
Gurganus grew up in the eastern North Carolina town in the 1950s. Drawn to visual art, the boy often carried a sketchbook.
As an artist, Gurganus had a keen eye and observed the culture in which he was raised. He took note of the performative aspects of small-town religion, the casual yet insidious effects of racial prejudice, and the strictures of social class. All of it was kindling he would later burn to fuel his fiction.
But like so many young artists, Gurganus thought the real story — at least his story — would be found outside his hometown, which at times felt provincial and suffocating. He fantasized about leaving: “When I got my first pair of hard shoes and saw where the bus station was,” he says, “I thought, I’m going to go north.”
Pick up your copy today at our partner independent bookshops:
- Bookmarks // Winston-Salem
- Books to Be Red // Ocracoke
- Buxton Village Books // Buxton
- Downtown Books // Manteo
- Highland Books // Brevard
- Main Street Books // Davidson
- Malaprop’s Bookstore/Café // Asheville
- McIntyre’s Books // Pittsboro
- MonkeyKat Books // Sanford
- Pelican Bookstore // Sunset Beach
- Quail Ridge Books // Raleigh
- Quarter Moon Books & Gifts // Topsail Beach
- Sassafras on Main //Waynesville
- Sassafras on Sutton // Black Mountain
- Scuppernong Books // Greensboro
- South Main Book Company // Salisbury
Our State Book Club with Wiley Cash Podcast
Join The New York Times best-selling author and North Carolina native Wiley Cash as he highlights great writers across the state and their work each month. Listen in on conversations between Cash and his author friends as they discuss how North Carolina inspires them on the Our State Book Club podcast.
Click here to start listening.
Our State Book Club Tote Bags
Rep the Our State Book Club with the new exclusive tote bag! Easily carry the latest book club pick or current Our State issue in this roomy and comfortable 100% cotton tote.
Book Reviews
Have you already finished this month’s book and need other recommendations? Check out these titles!
Through the Snow Globe
When a woman encounters a magical snow globe in her small North Carolina town, she’s given the opportunity to face her past and learn to appreciate her present.
Appalachia on the Table
What is Appalachian cuisine? After finding her grandmother’s cookbook, an author combs through the region’s culinary history to find the answer.
Now You Know It All
They aren’t heroes or villains, saints or sinners. The women of each short story in this new collection are complex, with secrets and desires much larger than the North Carolina towns in which they live.
